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California is suffering from a housing supply and affordability crisis brought on by over 10 years of producing housing at roughly 50 percent of what is needed to keep pace with population and job growth. In 2000, California built only 148,252 new homes while the state Department of Finance estimates the annual need to be upwards of 250,000 new homes. With such a disparity between supply and demand, it is no wonder why a family earning the state's median income would need to double that income to purchase the median-priced home.
And the situation is only expected to get worse - particularly in the high growth areas of the state where land cost are high and supply is scarce. Recent forecasts from the Department of Housing and Community Development predict an annual housing deficit in the Bay Area of more than 12,000 units per year for the next 10 years.
In October of 2000, the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service (FWS) finalized the designation for the Alameda Whipsnake: 406,598 acres covering Contra Costa, Alameda, San Joaquin and Santa Clara counties. The designation not only includes land that is currently occupied by the whipsnake but also unoccupied land that is "in the vicinity" of occupied habitat, is "suitable" habitat, or is "likely to develop" as suitable habitat.
Recent endangered species and critical habitat designations have greatly hindered California homebuilders' ability to meet the ever-increasing demand for housing. In the Bay Area, housing is consistently unaffordable to people of all income levels, and is particularly unaffordable to people of low to moderate incomes. For example:
- The Bay Area is home to six of the top ten least affordable housing markets in the nation.
- Homeownership in the Bay Area is out of reach: In San Francisco, only 12 percent of households can afford the median-price home, in Contra Costa County only 14 percent and in Alameda only 21 percent.
- According to the California Budget Project, over 21 percent of San Francisco residents, 20 percent of Santa Clara residents and 22 percent of Alameda/Contra Costa residents pay more than half of their incomes towards rent.
The broad sweeping action taken by the FWS concerning the Alameda Whipsnake will virtually shut down residential development in the designated areas - causing housing prices to soar even higher and making the dream of homeownership that much farther out of reach for Bay Area families.
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